Movie Review: 'Fast' and superfluous

Thursday

Apr 28, 2011 at 12:01 AMApr 28, 2011 at 11:08 AM

"Fast Five" will likely earn a place in the Macho Film Hall of Fame, with Diesel and Johnson as leading candidates for the revered title of the sultan of smackdown. During their fight scene, count how many walls and windows they smash.

Bob Tremblay

Five: The number of sequels to "The Fast and the Furious." Five: The IQ level demonstrated in the five films.

500: The number of times Vin Diesel's character talks about the importance of family in the latest film, "Fast Five," a slight exaggeration while his character kills a significant portion of the male population of Rio de Janeiro. No fatherhood for them.

$50 million: The possible first-week box office take of "Fast Five," not a slight exaggeration.

This film should be wildly popular with its target audience of young males who crave fast cars, over-the-top action, attractive women and a high body count. What's not to love?

Well, I suppose asking for even a modicum of intelligence from this film would be like asking a cannibal to become a vegan, but come on, does the movie have to be this stupid?

A bus packed with criminals with no police escort? Said bus flipping over multiple times and no one getting hurt? A car with an important chip hidden inside that the criminals can find but federal agents can't? A pregnant woman jumping 30 feet or so from a building, smashing through a roof and walking away without a scratch? Nine out of 10 obstetricians would recommend that a woman with child should not jump 30 feet from a building.

Later on, four characters take time out from their mission to race stolen police cars. Why? Because they can. And fast cars are so cool. But that's not exactly keeping a low profile, is it, boys?

While I can appreciate stupidity for stupidity's sake, I have a problem when stupid films take themselves seriously. Forget all the ridiculous and impossible stunts that are fun to watch –– I'm talking about characters waxing nostalgic about their fathers, and how wonderful they are, and how wonderful it must have been to know that dear old Dad raised a speed junkie, the fast-driving-car kind who shows no compunction about robbing and killing people. I'm getting teary-eyed just typing this.

Now some people might think the film isn't taking itself seriously. Then why all this family junk? Does the film really care about character development? Or are these scenes just filler to break up the action scenes?

Some of the dialogue is so moronic and the stunts so preposterous that a case could be made that the film has no intelligent pretensions. I'm just not completely convinced. Worse, no film this idiotic should be two hours and 10 minutes long. That's overkill, literally.

The three end up in Rio where Dom's brother, Vincent, (Matt Schulze) tells them about a car theft plan. This involves stealing three cars from a moving train. Don't try this at home, kids. During the closing credits, it said that these stunts shouldn't be tried at home. Really?

At film's end, I had a hankering to drive my car off a cliff, jump out of the car and do a swan dive into a lake, just like Vin and Paul. You mean they didn't do that? Shazam!

Anyway, one of the stolen cars contains the aforementioned chip, which just happens to contain the locations of all the drug dens of Rio's top drug dealer, a dapper gentleman named Reyes (Joaquim de Almeida). He would like the chip back in a very bad way. Dom has other plans. He intends to rob Reyes of all his drug money.

In the meantime, federal agents arrive on the scene led by Hobbs (Dwayne Johnson), who wants to bring down Dom in a very bad way.

To help pull off the heist, Dom recruits a demographic-pleasing group of criminals: two blacks, two Hispanics, an Asian and a woman. Nothing like pandering to boost the box office. Their characters also try to add a comic element to the film as they bicker among themselves.

The actors, in case you want a scorecard, are Tyrese Gibson, Chris "Ludacris" Bridges, Sung Kang, Tego Calderon, Don Omar and Gal Gadot. If you know their characters' names at the end of the movie, you win a Vin Diesel plush toy.

The stunts, at least, do come with a thrill factor, such as the scene where cars driven by Dom and Brian pull a huge safe through the streets of Rio, destroying everything in its wake.

The scene does seem to go on forever, though, as director Justin Lin, who was responsible for the last three "Fast" films, follows the credo of nothing succeeds like excess. That is particularly true regarding the amount of testosterone expended during this film. It practically ODs on the stuff. Some female viewers left the theater with full beards and an urge to belch loudly.

"Fast Five" will likely earn a place in the Macho Film Hall of Fame, with Diesel and Johnson as leading candidates for the revered title of the sultan of smackdown. During their fight scene, count how many walls and windows they smash.

Fans of the series –– and they are a hardcore bunch –– should make sure to stick around after film's end to discover details about, yes, another sequel. Be still my motor.